


Home Is Where The Heart Is

by erszebet



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Grief, Hurt and comfort, M/M, Mourning, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-06
Updated: 2017-05-06
Packaged: 2018-10-28 13:26:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,584
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10832193
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/erszebet/pseuds/erszebet
Summary: John's back from Martha's wedding, and Charleston brought up a lot of feelings John wasn't ready to deal with. Luckily, Alex and Lafayette are there to hold him through it.





	Home Is Where The Heart Is

**Author's Note:**

> Hey all! This is set right after one_golden_sun's "I Can Fix Anything If You Let Me Near," and John is struggling with grief for his mom. The song throughout in italics is "What Sarah Said" by Death Cab for Cutie.

John had forgotten how the sand felt underneath his feet. Sitting in his apartment in New York, he closed his eyes and remembered the sand crushing between his toes and the melodic crashing of the ocean. 

_And it came to me then, that every plan, is a tiny prayer to father time…_

When he was a child, his mother would lay on the beach for hours, and John’s eyes welled up as he tried to remember how her laughter sounded caught in the beach’s wind. Barely, her recalled echoes of it, but it washed away in memories of sterile hospital rooms and never-ending machines. 

_Each depending peak on the LCD took you a little farther away from me…_

He curled up tighter on the couch. Alex and Lafayette were still at work, and John’s most recent freelance job had ended earlier that day. In the whirlwind of returning from Martha’s wedding, he hadn’t really had time to sit down and process through the whole thing. 

Charleston. Home. His father. Alex. Lafayette. Home. 

_Among the vending machines and year old magazines, in a place where we only say goodbye…_

His heart twisted, knowing that Charleston hadn’t been home in a long time. Too many days spent either in a cramped hospital chair or drowning in a house with too much grief. He kept the crystalline version of Charleston, the one with the beaches and his mom, tucked in his head so he could remember all of its good parts whenever he wanted. Confronted with the reality of his childhood home and his father and all of the spots in the city that still carried traces of his mother had knocked John’s emotions sideways in ways he hadn’t been prepared to deal with. 

_Then the nurse comes around, and everyone lifts their head…_

He still wasn’t really prepared to deal with them, which is why he was curled up, crying quietly, hiccupping every few minutes as a soft, sad playlist played in the background. John had given up trying to fight the tears, and let the music wash over him and help pull out the emotions he felt sitting heavy in his chest. 

_But I’m thinking of what Sarah said…_

John took a breath during the pause of the song and buried his face into Pokey, pulling the stuffed turtle tighter. His grip on the animal felt like the only thing grounding him. 

_Love is watching someone die…_

As the words kept echoing at the end of the song, John tried to remember his mother. He tried to make her materialize in his brain, wanted to to pull on the corners of his memory to try and make her real. He’d only been fourteen, but shouldn’t that have been long enough for concrete memories? Why did it feel like wading through a fog to try and get her voice?

The door opened and shut. 

“Hello?” Alex called out at the same moment Lafayette bellowed, “Mon chou?” 

John sniffled, closing his eyes and wishing they’d come home separately today. He didn’t need both of them seeing this. 

Alex and Lafayette walked into the living room and simultaneous breaking of their hearts was palpable. John was in Lafayette’s biggest hoodie and Alex’s plaid sweatpants, curled up and holding Pokey as if his life depended on it. The lights were dim, but Alex could make out John’s red rimmed eyes. 

Lafayette was the first to move, and he walked up next to John and put his hand on his shoulder, delicately asking, “Can I sit with you, John?” 

John nodded silently and scooted over so Lafayette could sit in the corner. He leaned back into Lafayette’s warm embrace and felt some of the tension leave his body. A whole new wave of tears came to surface, and his sobbing began again in earnest. 

Alex went to get a glass of water before joining both of them on the couch. He knew John wouldn’t want it now, but once he’d calmed down, his poor boy would need something to re-hydrate him. Alex moved is closely and pulled John’s legs into his lap, holding on as best he could. 

“What’s wrong, baby boy?” Alex asked quietly. 

John struggled to regain control of his breathing as the sobs continued to make his chest heave, and finally, he managed to get out, “I m-miss my mom.” 

John choked on the last word and went back to crying, and Alex and Lafayette felt utterly useless. Crying over lost parents was not new to either of them, and Alex remembered back to years prior when he watched Lafayette grieve over his grandmother. He felt as useless then as he did now, but he knew had to try. John deserved for them to try and offer whatever comfort they could. 

Lafayette was raking his fingers through John’s hair and whispering, trying to get John to calm down so he could take a proper breath. 

“Mon petit, we have got you. We are right here. Will you please look at me? I want you to try and breathe with me, please?” Lafayette requested softly. 

John looked up at him and focused on Lafayette’s mouth and tried to forget the rest of the world and the deep aching pain in his chest that felt like a caving hole, and he tried to just breathe. 

In. Out. In. Out. In. Out. 

After a few minutes of this, John felt a bit better. His chest still ached and his eyes burned with tears, but the overwhelming feeling like he was drowning in his own grief and pain had subsided for the moment. 

Alex reached up to grab one of John’s hands and started rubbing his thumbs over the knuckles, and then brought the hand to his lips, planting small kisses on them. Tried to ground John with his touch and keep some of the pain away. 

“Do you want to talk about it, sweetheart?” Alex asked. 

John sat there for a minute, thinking, before he nodded. Lafayette and Alex waited silently, wanting to give John the time and space to say what he needed to say. 

“When I was eleven, my mom and I went to the beach one day, just the two of us. It was rare, y’know, because of my siblings, but I got my mom to myself for a few hours, and I was so happy,” John started, pausing to take a watery breath before continuing, “and I remember how the ocean’s breeze felt on my skin and how the sand crunched under my feet and how the sun was so hot, but…” John paused here and more tears spilled over onto his cheeks. Lafayette rubbed his arms encouragingly, and Alex returned to planting kisses on John’s hand. 

“But I can’t remember what her voice sounded like,” John whispered, “I can remember snippets, but I try to remember what we talked about or her voice and it’s just…gone. How could I forget her? She’s my mom, how could I forget her voice?” John all but yelled the end, and he closed his eyes. He felt the tears hot on his cheeks, and he tried to will away the cavernous ache in his chest and the guilt racking his brain. 

“Oh, mon petit, I am so sorry,” Lafayette said, pulling John closer. He leaned back so that he could stretch out, practically pulling John on top of him, and then Alex slotted in next to Lafayette, so they could both see John’s face and try to console him. 

“John, I…” Alex paused for a moment, thinking about his words carefully, trying to take better care of John than he did with Laf all those years ago. He took a breath and continued, “I only remember fragments, too. I was younger than you when my mom died, but I…I miss her every day. And I wish I could remember more, and I am so sorry she’s gone, sweetheart,” Alex finished, feeling his own throat choke up. 

Alex rarely talked openly about his mother’s death, and Lafayette’s heart shattered watching his two boys relive some of their worst pain. His parents had passed when he was so young. He grieved for them, of course, but in the way one grieves for what could have been. Losing his grandmother had been his most traumatic loss, and he still felt the hole in his chest whenever he ate pain au chocolat or smelled fresh lavender. 

All of them sat there, quietly, holding onto one another. Grief filled the room and silence echoed louder than any of them thought possible, and they stayed that way for a long time. Breathing. Quiet. Holding onto each other. 

John’s music continued softly in the background, and he felt his body start to sag with exhaustion. He’d been crying for what felt like hours, and lying in his lovers’s arms had given him a reprieve from the pain and the crying. 

John sniffed, and looked up at Lafayette and Alex. 

“I love you. Both of you,” John said quietly, continuing, “and…and I know my mom would have loved you both.” 

Alex and Lafayette both gave John watery smiles and reached up to run a hand through his hair and cup his tear-stained cheek. 

“We love you, too, little one. Forever,” Lafayette replied. 

“ _Te amo, mi querida,_ ” Alex whispered. 

On a quiet Charleston beach, the breeze quietened and the waves stood still and the faint echo of laughter filled the air, just for a moment.


End file.
